Contradictions in the NO
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    This has probably been discussed at length, but I wanted to vent this because of a rude encounter with a guest priest this morning. What contradictions have you noticed in the Novus Ordo? Contradictions in what is preached vs. what is taught/done in the Mass, etc. Here are some I've come up with.

    1. "Do not be ruled by popular culture." This is a quote from the guest priest's speech Monday night (he's here doing our parish 40 hours mission). The contradiction: the Novus Ordo Mass is completely ruled by modern culture.

    2. "The sin of the world is selfishness, self-absorption." This is another quote from the guest priests's speech Monday night. The contradiction: the anthropocentric Novus Ordo Mass.

    3. Concept of community, "all are welcome." This is a general concept that is taught and preached by Novus Ordo priests all over the place. The contradiction: those same priests exercise authority with anti-traditional sentiment.
  • MichaelDickson
    Posts: 419
    Those alleged contradictions are contradictions between the NO and something else, not 'in' the NO.

    As for whether the NO really does have the features that you mention, I don't think so. Not intrinsically. I agree that it can be made to have them (and this in virtue of its 'flexibility' or, if you prefer 'wishi-washiness' -- is that a word?), but I've seen plenty of NO masses that were done reverently, with no evident intrusions from modern culture, no hint that the mass is "all about us", celebrated by priests committed to tradition.

    (Yes, the congregation speaks during the NO, and yes, this speaking is (at times) a kind of 'dialogue' with the priest, and yes, that dialogue (as well as other parts of the NO) can be done and understood in an unacceptably anthropocentric fashion. I don't think that it must be.)

    I say all of the above as a lover of the EF, and wish that I had access to it on a regular basis, but I think that the problems that you identify, insofar as they are real, have more to do with the choices and actions of the people who are celebrating the NO than with its intrinsic qualities.
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  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985
    Popular culture? When the EF mass in my youth was rushed and finished in 30 minutes, with priests bragging about how fast they could get through it, was popular culture involved? Perhaps, if it was rushed because hardly anyone wanted to be there in the first place.

    The sin of the world is lazy priests and ineffective Christians. If we were all doing our jobs things just might be different.

    All are welcome? Sort of. All are definitely not welcome at many EF masses I have attended.
    Thanked by 5ClergetKubisz M. Jackson Osborn Liam CHGiffen Gavin
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    Ok. I see my original beef was completely personal. However, it cannot be refuted that the Novus Ordo opens itself up to these kinds of things, and allows itself to become whatever the celebrant wants it to be.

    Back to the original question, though, are there contradictions within the Novus Ordo itself? I am asking from a position of moderate ignorance, as I have studied what the Novus Ordo (through SC and GIRM) is supposed to be, insofar as the combined statements in those two documents are concerned, but from other sources and experiences, I am not sure.
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,424
    It's all the NO's fault! This shibboleth needs to be retired without ceremony. There is nothing instrinsically wrong with the NO. As I and many others have said multiple times, it's not the NO: it's what is done to it, or during it. None of the bad things done to, during, at, the NO are at all required by it, inherent in it, or, even, condoned by it. Further, as one has said before, if we didn't have the NO, all these irreverencies would be unloaded into the EF. This is a class of people peculiar to our age who would practice their horrors on whatever was at hand, and the rubrics of the EF wouldn't stop them. We would have pop-rock Latin propers, and more. All should stop confusing the worst manifestations of the spirit of our age with the victimised Novus Ordo.

    Just two weeks ago at St Basil's chapel at UST here in Houston, we celebrated the vigil of Christ the KIng, Novus Ordo. E-ve-ry last syllable of the mass was sung, even the Roman canon, there were six reverent student acolytes, incense, the people sang Fr Columba's Englished Orbis factor mass with the Ambrosian Gloria, the schola sang (quite professionally!) the Palmer-Burgess propers, there was a mediaval motet and a Lassus motet, and not one-single-non-ritual-word was uttered. The mass, from Trinitarian invocation to dismissal was a seamless garment of song-chant. THIS IS THE NOVUS ORDO! This is what the fathers of the council intended. Don't blame it on what liturgical clutzes have done with it. Give it credit for what WE have done with it.
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  • Caleferink
    Posts: 435
    I have been to and assisted at countless Masses in both the Ordinary and Extraordinary Forms. I have experienced Masses in both forms that are heaven on earth - done with reverence, beauty, attention to detail, etc. I have also experienced Masses in both forms that were anything but heavenly - sloppy, rushed (as @CharlesW mentioned), anthrocentric, etc. Granted, in my experience I've seen far more abuses in the OF than the EF (probably because the OF is what I have experienced more often), but I think that's due to poor seminary training of priests of certain generations and a general lack of proper liturgical catechesis. In terms of contradiction within the OF Mass - if it is done by the book with due reverence, there is no contradiction. The contradictions arise from people (clergy and laity alike) imposing their personal whims and illicit changes.
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  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,482
    Your word of the day is:
    synecdoche.
    Thanked by 2Liam Vilyanor
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,115
    The EF exists right now in the USA as something that is celebrated for people who intentionally wish to cultivate it. That's a much better situation for its liturgical praxis than if it became the form of precept, as it were.
    Thanked by 2CharlesW Adam Wood
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,424
    ...much better situation...

    With respect to your logic, Liam, but is this really the case, or is there a non sequitur here? I gather that there is quite some variety in the quality of EF masses, some being fittingly gorgeous and splendid, whilst others are grubby low masses which may or may not be sloppy and rushed. We have sufficient liturgical clutzes to go around for both the NO and the EF.
    Thanked by 1Liam
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,115
    MJO

    True enough. But my sense is that the grubby rushed ones are largely ruddered by congregations by them who *want* it that way. (For example, the hissing congregations who make clear there will be none of that glorious French EF practice here.) Of course, as in everything, I could be quite wrong about this.

    That said, if the OF were suppressed tonight, I would feel safe in wagering that EF praxis would not be improved by being made the default.
    Thanked by 2M. Jackson Osborn CHGiffen
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,424
    Ha! And I suspect that you would enjoy a handy return on your wager!
  • a_f_hawkins
    Posts: 3,478
    When the EF mass in my youth was rushed and finished in 30 minutes
    That long! One of the churches near here needed to get 700 people in, hear Mass, and out for the next batch, within a half hour on a Summer Sunday, repeatedly. Or failing that teach people that the obligation is fulfilled by being able to see someone who if he were tall enough could see the altar through the door (extra points if it rains all the time).
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985
    Sermons were optional in those days. Wish they still were!
  • madorganist
    Posts: 906
    Cardinals Ottaviani and Bacci:
    The Novus Ordo represents, both as a whole and in its details, a striking departure from the Catholic theology of the Mass as it was formulated in Session XXIII of the Council of Trent.

    http://sspx.org/en/ottaviani-intervention
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  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,220
    How many threads do we have to have, repeating the same old cranky complaints about the modern form of the Roman Rite?

    Is this really what the CMAA is for? (Answer: no.)

    Is this really what we want the Forum to be known for? I hope not.
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  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    Chonak,

    There is truth to what you say.

    On the other hand, as a way of explaining how intelligent people come to diametrically opposite positions on (relatively) simple questions and (thereby) make the lives of musicians difficult and sometimes miserable, there is value in exploring the topic to some degree, as one would expect a professional-concerns forum to do.
    Thanked by 1irishtenor
  • Richard MixRichard Mix
    Posts: 2,810
    I wasn't there, but
    "Do not be ruled by popular culture." "The sin of the world is selfishness, self-absorption."
    doesn't sound very rude, or like something that would be out of place in an EF homily.
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    While many NO Masses can be beautiful and reverent (though I vastly prefer the TLM), there is nothing beautiful or reverent about "showing each other the sign of peace" - EVEN IF that instruction is sung beautifully. It is always just an invitation for chaos, especially when watching from the choir loft.
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,424
    ...just an invitation for chaos...

    No! It Is Not!
    Another non sequitur! And an inexcusable one. There is no logical connexion between singing 'Let us show one another the sign of peace' and chaos. This doesn't follow at Walsingham. it doesn't follow at our masses at St Basil's; nor does it follow logically anywhere. If you are experiencing chaos the problem is catechesis and liturgically appropriate behaviour and discipline. It's not the inherent fault of 'passing the peace'. In fact, it seems to me meet to turn to the person next to me and say in a low and prayerful voice. 'peace be with you' - and that's all there is to it. Any disruptive chaos at some locus or another is the priest's fault - not the NO's!

    Speaking of 'chaos' - in the EF:
    There is a type of chaos, a certain cruelty, a certain status-conscious meanness that (so I am told) happens at EF masses. This chaos is the expectation amongst EF purists that the congregation are to remain silent observers of a sacred act performed by the clerical caste, and that any person so unfortunate as to utter a word will be glared at by one or more of the clericals, if not actually shouted at or scolded (more chaos!) as though he or she were a naughty child. This expectation of passive observance is a true chaos, for it is alienating, it requires of sentient beings that they leave their minds out in the car park, it assumes that they have considerably less human dignity and intelligence than the clerical caste, all of which is chaos worked on God's people, his flock who came to participate in his worship, not gawk at something in which they are thought too filthy to participate as fully sentient persons. There can be few chaoses greater than this. It is astonishing that people will actually subject themselves to such chaos and all but worship those who inflict it.
    (Of course, this chaos, like the chaotic happenings in the NO, is not something required by the rite itself, but is the result of clerical error, clerical snobbery, and very poor [as in deliberately demeaning] catechesis.)

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  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    I wasn't there, but

    "Do not be ruled by popular culture." "The sin of the world is selfishness, self-absorption."

    doesn't sound very rude, or like something that would be out of place in an EF homily.


    @RichardMix: This wasn't the rude part. Immediately before Mass with the children, I'm talking like as he was walking to the back of the nave to start Mass, he briefly pauses to say to me, with the mic still hot so everyone can hear him, "No Latin this morning whatsoever," and then just walks away. No discussion beforehand, no warning, just barks the order at me and walks off. Oh, and he shouted down the choir entrances for singing the Mass, such as the Sanctus, Memorial Acclamation, and the Agnus Dei.

    As a professional, I obliged and obeyed. We switched back to the ICEL chant Mass, but he didn't let us sing it.
  • rich_enough
    Posts: 1,050
    OK, I'll try not to be cranky.

    I find it interesting that, for all the huffy defenses of the NO, the fully sung mass in that form of the rite that MJO mentions is as rare as hen's teeth. As Peter Kwasniewski has observed: "It is understandable that defenders of the modern Roman Rite wish to compare the Ordinary Form 'as it might be' with the Extraordinary Form 'as it actually is,' but such a comparison is unreal, even fantastical, given the strength of custom built up by decades of impoverished, discontinuous, and abusive ars celebrand. The Novus Ordo 'High Masses' of the Oratories in London, Oxford, Toronto, or Vienna are beautiful exceptions that prove the rule."

    Maybe there's a reason for this that goes beyond the usual suspects of minimalism and clerical ignorance and indifference? I think it's telling that a number of places that celebrated the NO with full solemnity have moved, since Summorum Pontificum, to the EF, and, as Edward Schaeffer tells it, with good reason (the music has a lot to do with it).

    But aside from question of the ars celebrandi (it seems rather pointless to hackle whether abuses were worse, then or now), there's the question of the rite itself. One has to wonder how the changes made has actually produced a rite that has, as Vatican II mandated, grown "organically from forms already existing" and one more expressive of tradition, richer in symbolism and more formative for the faithful.
    Thanked by 2ClergetKubisz CCooze
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    Ok, then. Here are some principles I would like to critique:

    1. The Novus Ordo allows priests to celebrate the Mass in the manner of their choosing. The options are many, and some allow for a very loose and irreverent celebration of Holy Mass.

    2. Even the rules that have been given are not enforced.

    3. The prevailing attitude among Novus Ordo priests is that the Mass should be about the people, not God, while maintaining the facade of the latter.

    4. There seems to be no objective standard for beauty in the Mass anymore. This includes also music, architecture, and other arts. See number 3.

    5. Exactly what you see at most US Novus Ordo Masses has already been condemned by Pius IX in Auctorem Fidei.

    6. The Novus Ordo, as commonly practiced in the US, does not continue the traditions that it inherited, although it permits them among its many options. See number 1.

    If I think of more, I will add them.

    I would also like to add that the entire purpose of this thread was to vent frustration, and procure advice from my colleagues. Is there a more productive or appropriate place for me to do that?
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985

    1. The Novus Ordo allows priests to celebrate the Mass in the manner of their choosing. The options are many, and some allow for a very loose and irreverent celebration of Holy Mass.


    You've never seen an irreverent EF mass? I have.

    2. Even the rules that have been given are not enforced.


    And they never were in either rite, for the most part.

    4. There seems to be no objective standard for beauty in the Mass anymore. This includes also music, architecture, and other arts...


    Nor any objective standard for beauty in the general culture, either.

    5. Exactly what you see at most US Novus Ordo Masses has already been condemned by Pius IX in Auctorem Fidei.


    He's quite dead by now and not likely to be followed. Since the post-V2 popes have squandered any authority that once went with the office, they are all generally ignored.
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  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    You've never seen an irreverent EF mass? I have.


    Sure, it happens, but in the NO, it's ALLOWED.

    And they never were in either rite, for the most part.


    Wasn't aware of that. Can you tell me more about this?

    Nor any objective standard for beauty in the general culture, either.


    This is the main issue with pinning everything to the likes and dislikes of the PIPs. You are correct: the general culture does not appreciate objective beauty.

    He's quite dead by now and not likely to be followed. Since the post-V2 popes have squandered any authority that once went with the office, they are all generally ignored.


    At the risk of sounding like I hold a sedevacantist position, this prompts the following question: why have a Pope if nobody is going to obey him?
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985

    Wasn't aware of that. Can you tell me more about this?


    Priests in places at a distance from the chancery tend to do as they please. No one is looking and it has always happened.

    why have a Pope if nobody is going to obey him?


    You're asking an easterner? LOL. We tend to view popes more as patriarchs than the semi-divine status the ultra-montanies attribute to the office. However, he is what he is whether anyone obeys or not.

    Sure, it happens, but in the NO, it's ALLOWED.


    It's not so much allowed as ignored. No one really wants to address it and those in authority look the other way, even when they know better.
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  • Caleferink
    Posts: 435
    @CCooze: My apologies if I'm stating something here you already know, but the exchange of peace amongst the people is optional. No. 128 in the Order of Mass in the Ordinary Form Roman Missal states: "Then, if appropriate, the Deacon, or the Priest, adds: 'Let us offer each other the sign of peace'" (emphasis mine). I do believe like you that in many places it has gotten out of hand and that it may be prudent for clergy to not exercise this option. I bet many don't even realize it is optional.
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985
    A few years ago, I watched a video of a high mass in Chicago filmed before the wreckovation of the building and adoption of the NO. The comment in the group was, "That is the way the mass should be." Folks, that was the way it was in Chicago at that one point in time, and may have rarely been like that in Chicago ever again. The liturgy in the U.S. had degraded and deteriorated long before the NO came along. Don't look back to those "golden" days before the council. They were not as great as you think they were.
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  • Liam
    Posts: 5,115
    A good Lenten exercise: Whenever I get the urge to vent, I should lie down until the feeling passes away.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985
    A good Lenten exercise: Whenever I get the urge to vent, I should lie down until the feeling passes away.


    I had a similar feeling when considering a vocation in my youth. I had some scotch and it went away and never came back.

  • BenBen
    Posts: 3,114
    A few years ago, I watched a video of a high mass in Chicago filmed before the wreckovation of the building and adoption of the NO. The comment in the group was, "That is the way the mass should be." Folks, that was the way it was in Chicago at that one point in time, and may have rarely been like that in Chicago ever again. The liturgy in the U.S. had degraded and deteriorated long before the NO came along. Don't look back to those "golden" days before the council. They were not as great as you think they were.


    However, there seems to be a conflating of the texts of the rite and how it is celebrated. As one of the colloquium speakers said this year: reform of a rite doesn't need to mean a reform of texts. A good rite can be celebrated badly, and that doesn't mean you need to scrap a good rite to fix a bad attitude.
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  • Liam
    Posts: 5,115
    I confess the first time I saw the topic for this thread, I saw "Contractions in the NO". Thinking birth spasms...
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985
    I confess the first time I saw the topic for this thread, I saw "Contractions in the NO". Thinking birth spasms...


    I wondered where my bi-focals are. You are wearing them. LOL.
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985
    However, there seems to be a conflating of the texts of the rite and how it is celebrated. As one of the colloquium speakers said this year: reform of a rite doesn't need to mean a reform of texts. A good rite can be celebrated badly, and that doesn't mean you need to scrap a good rite to fix a bad attitude.


    I agree. But most problems are multi-faceted and a simple fix is not available.
  • bonniebede
    Posts: 756
    is venting a useful purpose for a thread?

    Perhaps it would be helpful to suggest other ways of venting your frustrations:

    Learn a new introit, gradual, Alleluia, offertorium and communion, using that pent up emotion to sing it forcefully and loudly until you know it well.

    Chop firewood.

    Clean all the old music cupboards and storage places in the choir loft / practice room, preferably singing Advent hymns in Latin while shredding bad or photocopied music.

    Get a tall ladder and wipe the cobwebs off the church CCTV cameras that make it look like there are ghosts moving around the church when viewed on screen

    Bake a cake and eat it.

    Bake a cake, decorate it to celebrate the anniversary of a particularly important magisterial document on sacred music 'Happy one hundredth and twelfth anniversary of Tra Le solicitudini' leave it on the pastors doorstep, ring the bell and run away. Make sure it is his favourite cake.

    Be subversive. Teach a child to read neumes.

    Be really subversive. Teach several children to read chant.

    Engage in all out guerrilla warfare. Teach a whole lot of kids to read Latin, sing chant, and be reverent.

    i am sure you can come up with more....
    Thanked by 5Liam JL CHGiffen Spriggo MichaelDickson
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,985

    Perhaps it would be helpful to suggest other ways of venting your frustrations:


    Oh, hush! You are a bigger nag than my mother was. LOL.

    In all seriousness, there is always more work to be done than will or effort to do it.
    Thanked by 1bonniebede
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,482
    the fully sung mass in that form of the rite that MJO mentions is as rare as hen's teeth


    The difference here is that hen aren't supposed to have teeth.

    Also, hens --- like the TLM --- evolved slowly over time to their present state, while the Novus Ordo was intelligently designed in the post-Conciliar era.
    Thanked by 4CharlesW bonniebede Ben madorganist
  • bonniebede
    Posts: 756
    Oh, hush! You are a bigger nag than my mother was. LOL


    Possibly. It is my favourite way to vent. Isn't that the purpose of this thread?

    Thanked by 3CharlesW CHGiffen irishtenor
  • madorganist
    Posts: 906
    Reform of a rite doesn't need to mean a reform of texts. A good rite can be celebrated badly, and that doesn't mean you need to scrap a good rite to fix a bad attitude.
    But this is exactly what Bugnini and company did. It's what the Council Fathers authorized in Sacrosanctum concilium:
    50. The rite of the Mass is to be revised in such a way that the intrinsic nature and purpose of its several parts, as also the connection between them, may be more clearly manifested, and that devout and active participation by the faithful may be more easily achieved.

    For this purpose the rites are to be simplified, due care being taken to preserve their substance; elements which, with the passage of time, came to be duplicated, or were added with but little advantage, are now to be discarded; other elements which have suffered injury through accidents of history are now to be restored to the vigor which they had in the days of the holy Fathers, as may seem useful or necessary.
    It's what Pius XII did with his Holy Week reforms, Pius X with his reformed breviary, and Urban VIII with his "corrected" office hymns.
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    Engage in all out guerrilla warfare. Teach a whole lot of kids to read Latin, sing chant, and be reverent.


    This is exactly what I've been doing at the school: teaching the children what Sacred Music really is and how to do it. I just wish the powers that be would let them.
    Thanked by 2bonniebede CHGiffen
  • bonniebede
    Posts: 756
    Ah yes. but the trick is, someday the kids will be in power....mwahahaha
    Thanked by 3Ben ClergetKubisz CHGiffen
  • BenBen
    Posts: 3,114
    But this is exactly what Bugnini and company did. It's what the Council Fathers authorized in Sacrosanctum concilium.


    I'm not saying that was necessarily a good thing.
  • CCoozeCCooze
    Posts: 1,259
    @Caleferink Yes, it is optional, but I can only think of 1 time that I (happily) noticed its being left out.

    But... MJO, I've never been to a Mass where offering each other a sign of peace did not result in people turning around to the people behind them. That's something that doesn't really have a place in Mass, especially with hand-shaking, waving, hugging, kissing, perhaps crossing the aisle to shake a friend's hand. Even the most subtle gesture is still distracting. In multiple states, multiple parishes this IS what happens. It is chaotic, and it is inviting a clear distraction from the solemnity of the Mass.

    Also, the EF, even the Low Mass, clearly has responses that make complete sense for the church-goers to follow. I've not known a Mass where someone was obviously annoyed at anyone giving proper responses during Low, Sung, or Solemn High Mass.
    Therefore, I don't know who told you about it, there's nothing "purist" about not wanting the responses which are listed in every hand or pew missal that we've grown up using.
  • M. Jackson Osborn
    Posts: 8,424
    CCooze -
    You are, of course, quite indisputably correct!
    What you describe is indeed chaotic and deeply disturbing spiritually. It shatters the sacral time, space, and action. I have witnessed it and experience it as profoundly hurtful and offensive. It makes me wonder, really, 'what am I doing here'. One can only wonder dumbfoundedly what such people's concept of the mass and the sacred is, and how they can be so forgetful of him in whose house and very presence they are.

    Still, I would maintain (as I hinted at above) that the fault does not lie inherently in the ancient passing of the peace. It lies directly and solely with the priests who permit chaos and are, themselves, blind to its utter inappropriateness. It can be, and was intended to be, a warm and holy thing to, before receiving our Lord, turn (only!) to one's neighbour and with quiet and respectful prayerfulness share 'peace be with you' (a discreet 'liturgical embrace' being optional). This is not disruptive but is what passing the peace should be like. The rite of peace is very ancient, but is one of those things (like receiving communion!) that sort of got lost over the centuries. Its restoration should not (nor does not, inherently) invite the actual chaos that erupts in too many churches and is allowed (if not encouraged) by shallow-minded priests. As with the NO itself, don't blame the rite - blame the people who don't understand how to behave where they are.

    (An interesting variant of passing the peace was common in England in Sarum times, particularly, I think, in monasteries. Rather than a discreet word or two, or the time-honoured 'liturgical embrace', a 'pax board' would be passed 'round. This was a small board covered in fine cloth and embroidery, the passing of which represented sharing the peace. This would be an improvement over the chaos of which you speak!)
  • JL
    Posts: 171
    My favorite Sign of Peace was at a Mass I attended in southern India on a pretty garden-variety Sunday. At the invitation, "Let us offer one another a sign of Christ's peace", the congregation first bowed toward the sanctuary (to the ministers there), and then to the center aisle (and therefore the people on the other side of the nave), and exchanged quick bows with the people near them if they wished. In less than ten seconds it was time for the Agnus Dei, and there was no talking or touching. I don't know how one would introduce this practice to the average U.S. congregation, but if it could be done, it would be a beautiful thing.

    The re-introduction of the pax-brede would also be brilliant development, but I'm not holding my breath. It would be enough if we could observe the rule common to the Pax and to basketball: if you move both your feet, it's a foul.
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen M. Jackson Osborn
  • TheUbiquitous
    Posts: 70
    I'd like to focus on the third point:

    all are welcome.


    The contradiction here is slightly more generalized. The NO as celebrated tends to emphasize outward showings of affected joy or cheeriness. Yet those who are mourning are not welcome, nor are the introverted, nor the pensive, nor the thoughtful, nor the contemplative, nor the socially withdrawn, nor the generally suffering, &c. In certain places, these persons are generally shamed or goaded during Mass into joining in that affected joy or cheeriness of the whole community when in fact their active participation at Mass --- or their joining the community --- would naturally and genuinely require a different outward mode of participation.

    Yes, it is ruled by the personality and pettiness of the priest, but even without that kind of parochial harassment on the part of the priest it can exist in the atmosphere of the place, in the culture of the place. It may have to do with the emphasis on the dialogue of the Mass between the laity and priest, but this question requires more careful study.
  • OraLabora
    Posts: 218
    I attend Mass at a local Benedictine abbey of the Solesmes Congregation (in Canada... I'll let you folks Google it!), of which I am an oblate. The Ordinary Form Mass is celebrated in a mix of French and Latin every single day. The propers are entirely sung in Latin Gregorian chant; the Ordinary too (with the Kyrie in Greek). All in complete fidelity to the Graduale Romanum, with care and reverence. The rest is done in French plainchant. The ONLY thing not sung, is the homily. It is beautiful, it is reverent.

    I fully agree with Mr. Osborn that if the EF were the only form of the Mass, the same folks that currently ruin the OF Mass would do the same hack job on the EF. If they won't follow OF rubrics, there's nothing to suggest that they'd be any more inclined to follow EF rubrics. I love trains, and the EF has sort of reminds me of steam locomotives. The few that remain today are in the loving care of enthusiasts who polish them and meticulously care for them, creating a romanticized notion of what steam trains were all about. In reality, when steam was king, they were grubby, dirty, polluted and crazily inefficient (check out an EF ceremonial on how to incense the altar...); most of us remember the plaintive whistle, and the rhythmic chugging, but not the grime, smoke and ash that had housewives running to pull in the laundry off the line at train time. The EF is now kind of the same, looked after by enthusiasts with similar care, and many remember the Missa Cantata or the Solemn High Mass but forget the 20-minute speed Mass, the mumbled low Mass, the people fainting because of the overlong communion fast on a hot day, etc.

    I do wish we'd be able to put this issue to rest once and for all and focus instead on making *every* Mass beautiful.

    Ora
    Thanked by 5CharlesW chonak M. Jackson Osborn CHGiffen bonniebede
  • fcbfcb
    Posts: 339
    The re-introduction of the pax-brede would also be brilliant development


    Be careful what you wish for. Because members of the congregation kissed the pax-brede in the order of their precedence in the parish, scuffles would sometimes break out as people jockeyed to be the next to kiss it, and in at least one case someone used the pax-brede itself to bean someone else. Liturgical chaos is by no means a recent invention.
    Thanked by 7CharlesW madorganist M. Jackson Osborn CHGiffen bonniebede Adam Wood JL
  • madorganist
    Posts: 906
    If they won't follow OF rubrics, there's nothing to suggest that they'd be any more inclined to follow EF rubrics.
    Actually, there are a couple of thing to suggest so. 1) The EF rubrics are considered to bind under pain of sin. 2) There's something called an interdict that the ordinary can use to enforce obedience. In my old diocese, a priest was placed under interdict for several days after praying the Canon audibly just a few years before the changes.
    Thanked by 1CCooze
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,220
    Those two points don't amount to a hill o' beans.

    (1) If priests believed that EF rubrics are or were binding under pain of sin, they would believe the same for OF rubrics.

    (2) The sort of enforcement you cite gives enforcement a bad name. It sounds exaggerated, excessive, and arbitrary -- and if it was not disputed by the priest, that's probably only because the duration of the punishment was short.
  • madorganist
    Posts: 906
    1) Some believe so and act accordingly. Some don't care. Some invoke the so-called spirit of Vatican II to impose their own ideas of what the liturgy should look and sound like. Yes, I've encountered EF celebrants who deliberately ignored rubrics. One made a conscious decision to omit some of the prayers for the blessing of the candles on February 2; another chose to impose the blessed ashes in the novus ordo fashion instead of at the Communion rail; others rush through Communion and fail to say the formula of administration for each communicant.

    2) Indeed. The old archbishop was known for his no-nonsense approach—a "holy terror," as one priest described him.
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    1. I would like to point out that many of those examples are in accordance with what I've experienced as reasons given by priests to ignore or omit parts that were seemingly required: expediency. They want to move things along faster. Perhaps there's someone in the pews complaining?

    2. People would hate me as a bishop (not that Holy Orders are in my future, though).
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